Bank repos hit an all-time record

[BJJ-Blue]

"Bank repossessions and foreclosure auctions hit record levels in the third quarter, RealtyTrac said on Thursday.

372,445 foreclosure auctions were scheduled in July, August and September, while 288,345 properties were repossessed by lenders over the same time period.

Overall foreclosure filings edged up to 930,437 in the third quarter, a 4% increase from the previous quarter. One in every 139 homeowners received a foreclosure filing during those three months.

Bank repossessions, or REOs, also are on the rise. In September, a record 102,134 homes were taken back by banks. It's the first time repos have topped 100,000 in a single month."

Source:
http://money.cnn.com/2010/10/14/real_estate/RealtyTrac_foreclosure/index.htm?hpt=T2


Looks like we are starting to see some major 'Change'. Record numbers of Americans are seeing a 'Change' from home owner to renter.

[Drake]

Blaming Pres Obama for the housing crisis caused by greedy banks is like blaming Fmr Pres Bush for Iraq instead of a lying George Tenet.

[MasterKiller]

Blaming Pres Obama for the housing crisis caused by greedy banks is like blaming Fmr Pres Bush for Iraq instead of a lying D1ck Cheney.

Fixed that for you.


"Bank repossessions and foreclosure auctions hit record levels in the third quarter, RealtyTrac said on Thursday.

Officials in 50 states and the District of Columbia have launched a joint investigation into allegations that mortgage companies mishandled documents and broke laws in foreclosing on hundreds of thousands of homeowners.

"This is not simply about a glitch in paperwork," said Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller, who is leading the probe. "It's also about some companies violating the law and many people losing their homes."

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/business/homepage/20101014_Foreclosure_probe_goes_national.html

[sanjuro_ronin]

Ah, foreclosures and repossions, what wonderful things.
You can have a car for 4 years have paid it basically all off, but have only one year left and the back can take the whole car, nice.
You could have paid your mortage for years, decades even, but the bank can foreclose and get the WHOLE house, even though mots of it is paid off.
Nice.
I guess things will get "reviewed" when someone finally feels their cheerios and caps some repo guy or some bank officer.

[BJJ-Blue]

Blaming Pres Obama for the housing crisis caused by greedy banks is like blaming Fmr Pres Bush for Iraq instead of a lying George Tenet.

I've clearly stated in the past it was caused by Gov't intervention. Namely the Community Reinvestment Act, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and Chris Dodd and Barney Frank.

As to MK's assertion, I've read about this. I've heard people saying it is indeed paperwork issues, and not one example of a family being foreclosed on when their payments were up to date has been found. Time will tell what the real story is on this though. With all 50 States launching investigations, if there have been any examples of the banks foreclosing when they should not have, those stories will come to light.

[BJJ-Blue]

Ah, foreclosures and repossions, what wonderful things.
You can have a car for 4 years have paid it basically all off, but have only one year left and the back can take the whole car, nice.
You could have paid your mortage for years, decades even, but the bank can foreclose and get the WHOLE house, even though mots of it is paid off.
Nice.
I guess things will get "reviewed" when someone finally feels their cheerios and caps some repo guy or some bank officer.

Actually if you call your lender when you have money problems, they usually work with you. The last thing they want to do is repo things. They usually lose money on repos. I've had to make late payments in the past (despite being a rich Republican), and I always call the bank. Not only have they always worked with me, they haven't dinged my credit either. The worst thing a borrower can do is to ignore it and hope it goes away.

[sanjuro_ronin]

Actually if you call your lender when you have money problems, they usually work with you. The last thing they want to do is repo things. They usually lose money on repos. I've had to make late payments in the past (despite being a rich Republican), and I always call the bank. Not only have they always worked with me, they haven't dinged my credit either. The worst thing a borrower can do is to ignore it and hope it goes away.

True, but I know of one case that, instead of filing for bankruptcy this person did a consumer proposal, basicaly paying back 10c on the dollar, which is far better than the banks and CC getting nothing.
One of the banks took his car that had less than one year left to pay on it but the funny thing is that it wasn't even one of the banks that he filled a consumer proposal for!
They got wind of the proposal from the credit companies and took his car.
Even after he said he would continue to pay AND had NEVER missed a payment, ever.!

[MasterKiller]

I've clearly stated in the past it was caused by Gov't intervention. Namely the Community Reinvestment Act, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and Chris Dodd and Barney Frank.

As to MK's assertion, I've read about this. I've heard people saying it is indeed paperwork issues, and not one example of a family being foreclosed on when their payments were up to date has been found. Time will tell what the real story is on this though. With all 50 States launching investigations, if there have been any examples of the banks foreclosing when they should not have, those stories will come to light.

At JPMorgan Chase & Company, they were derided as “Burger King kids” — walk-in hires who were so inexperienced they barely knew what a mortgage was.

At Citigroup and GMAC, dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s on home foreclosures was outsourced to frazzled workers who sometimes tossed the paperwork into the garbage.

And at Litton Loan Servicing, an arm of Goldman Sachs, employees processed foreclosure documents so quickly that they barely had time to see what they were signing.

“I don’t know the ins and outs of the loan,” a Litton employee said in a deposition last year. “I’m not a loan officer.”

As the furor grows over lenders’ efforts to sidestep legal rules in their zeal to reclaim homes from delinquent borrowers, these and other banks insist that they have been overwhelmed by the housing collapse.

But interviews with bank employees, executives and federal regulators suggest that this mess was years in the making and came as little surprise to industry insiders and government officials. The issue gained new urgency on Wednesday, when all 50 state attorneys general announced that they would investigate foreclosure practices. That news came on the same day that JPMorgan Chase acknowledged that it had not used the nation’s largest electronic mortgage tracking system, MERS, since 2008.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Bankers-Ignored-Signs-of-nytimes-2833356369.html?x=0

[David Jamieson]

Our Canadian Dollar is at Parity as of this morning which tells me that the american dollar is flagging hard.

that's how it works. If canada's dollar is around 80 cents, pretty much all is well in the world over here, but when we hit parity and climb over, then the US is in some deep doo doo financially speaking and by proxy so are we because people have to pay more for our natural resources and goods and services.

Our economies are intrinsically and extrinsically linked. The US is our biggest trading partner and in fact our two economies working together are quite powerful.

so if you're wondering why the canucks b1tch about your wall street thieves, that's why.

[BJJ-Blue]

Our Canadian Dollar is at Parity as of this morning which tells me that the american dollar is flagging hard.

When you madly print paper money, the value of said paper money goes down.


so if you're wondering why the canucks b1tch about your wall street thieves, that's why.

You guys should be more concerned with the possibility we will see inflation at the levels we saw during the Carter years.

[BJJ-Blue]

I totally get what you're saying MK, and I'm not disagreeing with it at all.

I am saying, however, that we are not seeing any reports of people who are paid up on their mortgage payments getting repo notices or being thrown out of their houses. This may very well be a case of people not making the payments, but expecting to be able to stay in a house they are not paying for because someone forgot to cross the T's and dot the I's on some paperwork.

[Reality_Check]

I've clearly stated in the past it was caused by Gov't intervention. Namely the Community Reinvestment Act...

And as I've clearly and repeatedly demonstrated in the past, the CRA had nothing to do with the subprime mess.

http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showpost.php?p=884981&postcount=1154


That has been addressed.



Here is some interesting information: http://www.traigerlaw.com/publicatio...udy_1-7-08.pdf

"Our study concludes that CRA Banks were substantially less likely than other lenders to make the kinds of risky home purchase loans that helped fuel the foreclosure crisis.

Specifically, our analysis shows that:

(1) CRA Banks were significantly less likely than other lenders to make a high cost loan;

(2) The average APR on high cost loans originated by CRA Banks was appreciably lower than the average APR on high cost loans originated by other lenders;

(3) CRA Banks were more than twice as likely as other lenders to retain originated loans in their portfolio; and

(4) Foreclosure rates were lower in MSAs with greater concentrations of bank branches."



"More than half of subprime loans were made by independent mortgage companies not subject to comprehensive federal supervision; another 30 percent of such originations were made by affiliates of banks or thrifts, which are not subject to routine examination or supervision, and the remaining 20 percent were made by banks and thrifts."

I.e., the majority of the subprime loans were made by companies not subject to CRA.

http://www.house.gov/apps/list/heari...barr021308.pdf

Janet Yellin, President of the San Francisco Federal Reserve Board:

"There has been a tendency to conflate the current problems in the subprime market with CRA-motivated lending, or with lending to low-income families in general. I believe it is very important to make a distinction between the two. Most of the loans made by depository institutions examined under the CRA have not been higher-priced loans, and studies have shown that the CRA has increased the volume of responsible lending to low- and moderate-income households. We should not view the current foreclosure trends as justification to abandon the goal of expanding access to credit among low-income households, since access to credit, and the subsequent ability to buy a home, remains one of the most important mechanisms we have to help low-income families build wealth over the long term."

"According to the 2006 HMDA data, 19 percent of the conventional first lien mortgage loans originated by depository institutions were higher-priced, compared to 23 percent by bank subsidiaries, 38 percent by other bank affiliates, and more than 40 percent by independent mortgage companies. Robert B. Avery, Kenneth P. Brevoort, and Glenn B. Canner, “The 2006 HMDA Data,” Federal Reserve Bulletin, Volume 94 (2007), p. A89."

http://www.frbsf.org/news/speeches/2008/0331.html

As I noted above, independent mortgage companies are not subject to the CRA.


From a speech by Federal Reserve Board Governor Randall S. Kroszner:

http://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/speech/kroszner20081203a.htm#f6

Some critics of the CRA contend that by encouraging banking institutions to help meet the credit needs of lower-income borrowers and areas, the law pushed banking institutions to undertake high-risk mortgage lending. We have not yet seen empirical evidence to support these claims, nor has it been our experience in implementing the law over the past 30 years that the CRA has contributed to the erosion of safe and sound lending practices...

The CRA does not stipulate minimum targets or goals for lending, investments, or services. Rather, the law provides incentives for financial institutions to help meet the credit needs of lower-income people and areas, consistent with safe and sound banking practices, and commensurately provides them favorable CRA consideration for those activities. By requiring regulators to make CRA performance ratings and evaluations public and to consider those ratings when reviewing applications for mergers, acquisitions, and branches, the Congress created an unusual set of incentives to promote interaction between lenders and community organizations.

Given the incentives of the CRA, bankers have pursued lines of business that had not been previously tapped by forming partnerships with community organizations and other stakeholders to identify and help meet the credit needs of underserved communities. This experimentation in lending, often combined with financial education and counseling and consideration of nontraditional measures of creditworthiness, expanded the markets for safe lending in underserved communities and demonstrated its viability; as a result, these actions attracted competition from other financial services providers, many of whom were not covered by the CRA. There are many fine examples of community development lending and investment activities designed to address needs in the poorest of areas, including many of those highlighted by the case studies in this report...

Over the years, the Federal Reserve has prepared two reports for the Congress that provide information on the performance of lending to lower-income borrowers or neighborhoods--populations that are the focus of the CRA. These studies found that lending to lower-income individuals and communities has been nearly as profitable and performed similarly to other types of lending done by CRA-covered institutions. Thus, the long-term evidence shows that the CRA has not pushed banks into extending loans that perform out of line with their traditional businesses. Rather, the law has encouraged banks to be aware of lending opportunities in all segments of their local communities as well as to learn how to undertake such lending in a safe and sound manner...

In analyzing the available data, we focused on two distinct metrics: loan origination activity and loan performance. With respect to the first question concerning loan originations, we wanted to know which types of lending institutions made higher-priced loans, to whom those loans were made, and in what types of neighborhoods the loans were extended. This analysis allowed us to determine what fraction of subprime lending could be related to the CRA.

Our analysis of the loan data found that about 60 percent of higher-priced loan originations went to middle- or higher-income borrowers or neighborhoods. Such borrowers are not the populations targeted by the CRA. In addition, more than 20 percent of the higher-priced loans were extended to lower-income borrowers or borrowers in lower-income areas by independent nonbank institutions--that is, institutions not covered by the CRA.

Putting together these facts provides a striking result: Only 6 percent of all the higher-priced loans were extended by CRA-covered lenders to lower-income borrowers or neighborhoods in their CRA assessment areas, the local geographies that are the primary focus for CRA evaluation purposes. This result undermines the assertion by critics of the potential for a substantial role for the CRA in the subprime crisis. In other words, the very small share of all higher-priced loan originations that can reasonably be attributed to the CRA makes it hard to imagine how this law could have contributed in any meaningful way to the current subprime crisis...

The final analysis we undertook to investigate the likely effects of the CRA on the subprime crisis was to examine foreclosure activity across neighborhoods grouped by income. We found that most foreclosure filings have taken place in middle- or higher-income neighborhoods; in fact, foreclosure filings have increased at a faster pace in middle- or higher-income areas than in lower-income areas that are the focus of the CRA.

Two key points emerge from all of our analysis of the available data. First, only a small portion of subprime mortgage originations are related to the CRA. Second, CRA- related loans appear to perform comparably to other types of subprime loans. Taken together, as I stated earlier, we believe that the available evidence runs counter to the contention that the CRA contributed in any substantive way to the current mortgage crisis.

[Reality_Check]

Addition to my last post.


Here is another study supporting my point.

(LMI = low to moderate income)

http://traigerlaw.com/publications/The_community_reinvestment_act_of_1977-not_guilty_1-26-09.pdf
Critics of the CRA claim that the law compels banks to downgrade their credit standards in order to make mortgage loans to unqualified LMI borrowers. We hypothesized that if this was true, lending data from 2007, a time of tightened underwriting standards and regulatory emphasis on safety and soundness, would show significantly diminished lending to LMI borrowers by CRA-subject banks.

Instead, our analysis of 2007 data indicates that the percentage of LMI applications that were originated by CRA-subject banks remained stable even in the climate of heightened scrutiny and wariness that prevailed. This finding contradicts the notion that compliance with the CRA is dependent on imprudent lending. Thus, we conclude that the CRA cannot be rationally blamed for current problems in the mortgage market, much less for the U.S. financial crisis.

That CRA-subject banks continue to make mortgage loans to LMI borrowers while simultaneously strengthening their underwriting standards not only contradicts the claims of critics who blame the CRA for our present crisis, but also suggests that without the 32-year-old law, the home mortgage market might be in even worse condition. This suggestion is reinforced by our 2008 study (http://www.traigerlaw.com/publications/traiger_hinckley_llp_cra_foreclosure_study_1-7-08.pdf), which showed CRA-subject banks were substantially less likely than other lenders to engage in the risky lending practices that helped fuel the foreclosure crisis. Moreover, a recent Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco review of LMI lending found “the CRA, and particularly its emphasis on loans made within a lender’s assessment area, helped to ensure responsible lending, even during a period of overall declines in underwriting standards.”

[Reality_Check]

I am saying, however, that we are not seeing any reports of people who are paid up on their mortgage payments getting repo notices or being thrown out of their houses. This may very well be a case of people not making the payments, but expecting to be able to stay in a house they are not paying for because someone forgot to cross the T's and dot the I's on some paperwork.

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-10-07/man-who-had-no-mortgage-faced-foreclosure-anyway-ann-woolner.html

Jason Grodensky paid cash for a South Florida home last December. With no mortgage and full ownership, he had no fear of foreclosure.

And yet, Bank of America foreclosed on the house seven months later, according to the South Florida Sun Sentinel. The court-ordered foreclosure took place July 15.

[BJJ-Blue]

And as I've clearly and repeatedly demonstrated in the past, the CRA had nothing to do with the subprime mess.

Ok, fine. Now please tell me how Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac had nothing to do with it.

[BJJ-Blue]

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-10-07/man-who-had-no-mortgage-faced-foreclosure-anyway-ann-woolner.html

Jason Grodensky paid cash for a South Florida home last December. With no mortgage and full ownership, he had no fear of foreclosure.

And yet, Bank of America foreclosed on the house seven months later, according to the South Florida Sun Sentinel. The court-ordered foreclosure took place July 15.

Did you read the entire article?

"While deed records were handed off to the electronic registration system, the borrower’s note promising to pay was sent on a circuitous route from loan originator to other mortgage firms and banks until it was pooled with other mortgages into trusts underwritten by banks and sold to investors.

For Jason Grodensky, the problem was that foreclosure proceedings that began before he bought the house in a short sale continued after he got ownership."

When you buy something like a house or a car, you should always make sure there is not a lien on it and that things like repo orders or foreclosure proceedings have not been levied on said property.

[Reality_Check]

Ok, fine. Now please tell me how Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac had nothing to do with it.

I never said anything about Fannie or Freddie. I'm just trying to finally put a stop to your oft repeated canard about the CRA.

[BJJ-Blue]

I never said anything about Fannie or Freddie. I'm just trying to finally put a stop to your oft repeated canard about the CRA.

I stated several ways Gov't interference caused the sub-prime mess. You tried to refute only one of those ways I mentioned. And I've mentioned Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, along with Chris Dodd and Barney Frank repeatedly too. Will you take those assertions on next?

[Reality_Check]

I stated several ways Gov't interference caused the sub-prime mess. You tried to refute only one of those ways I mentioned. And I've mentioned Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, along with Chris Dodd and Barney Frank repeatedly too. Will you take those assertions on next?

I have neither the desire nor the interest to do so. My only purpose was to refute your claim regarding the CRA. Which is why I stopped quoting your earlier post at the words "Community Reinvestment Act." If I had wished to discuss the remainder of your post, I would have quoted it in its entirety.

[BJJ-Blue]

I have neither the desire nor the interest to do so. My only purpose was to refute your claim regarding the CRA. Which is why I stopped quoting your earlier post at the words "Community Reinvestment Act." If I had wished to discuss the remainder of your post, I would have quoted it in its entirety.

I understand.

So does this mean you cannot refute my assertion that Gov't interference caused the sub-prime mess?

[Reality_Check]

I understand.

So does this mean you cannot refute my assertion that Gov't interference caused the sub-prime mess?

No, aside from refuting the comment re: CRA, I have no interest in this discussion. In a nutshell, to quote Jerry Seinfeld: "I choose not to run." :D

[BJJ-Blue]

No, aside from refuting the comment re: CRA, I have no interest in this discussion. In a nutshell, to quote Jerry Seinfeld: "I choose not to run." :D

It's always fun to ask someone in a debate to answer a question and have them admit they can't/wont.

It was hilarious watching O'Reilly OWN those liberals on The View yesterday. Just one simple question and the curses and insults were flying, followed by two of them having to run off the stage to duck the question. And I don't even like O'Reilly. ;)

[Reality_Check]

It's always fun to ask someone in a debate to answer a question and have them admit they can't/wont.

It was hilarious watching O'Reilly OWN those liberals on The View yesterday. Just one simple question and the curses and insults were flying, followed by two of them having to run off the stage to duck the question. And I don't even like O'Reilly. ;)

Please note, I never said I can't. I just have no interest in the discussion (with the limited exception as it pertains to the CRA) as it has been hashed and rehashed for the last two years.

[BJJ-Blue]

Please note, I never said I can't. I just have no interest in the discussion (with the limited exception as it pertains to the CRA) as it has been hashed and rehashed for the last two years.

Excuses, excuses.

Face it, Gov't intervention caused the mess. Of course if you can disprove that, I'll be posting here how I was incorrect and shown the errors of my ways by you.

[solo1]

Having dealt with Wells Fargo for nearly two years after my wife lost her job in 2008 I have read in earnest the debacle with these foreclosures. Read an article interviewing a woman in the Fort Mill SC wells fargo office where she was signing off on 500 foreclosures a day without checking the appropriate documentation, she said it was not her job , just sign stuff. Between that and their ownership of Wachovia accused of laundering billions of foreign drug money I have lost a lot of faith in the banking industry. On the Wells front I hope they are savaged by the Justice Department until they shoot blood out of every orifice on their bodies.

[Drake]

Excuses, excuses.

Face it, Gov't intervention caused the mess. Of course if you can disprove that, I'll be posting here how I was incorrect and shown the errors of my ways by you.

I'd argue that LACK of government intervention caused the mess. Had there been any oversight on these financial institutions, auto industries, etc, we could have at least identified the problem before waiting until the meltdown. Laissez Faire stops the second their own greed can singlehandedly collapse the entire global economy. When that situation occurs, like it or not, you have to be a team player.

Your philosophy only applies to small businesses, where irresponsibility can only do so much damage, and replacing them comes easily. However, we were too successful for our own good, and now we have situations where, as a certain forefather pointed out, made banks more dangerous than standing armies.

If these major private banks were not bailed out, unlike GM, which may have had a successor lined up, what do you predict would have happened? Because most analysts from all walks of life, and of all political affiliations, agree that letting them fail would kick our way of life back to the stone age. Underestimating the impact of something that we prevented from happening in no way reduces the scope of what COULD have happened. Had these banks not been allowed to run rampant, using assets they didn't have to grant loans to people who didn't deserve them, to pay for projects and investments which were risky to begin with, there would not have even been a discussion about a bailout, because we could have nipped the problem at the bud.

We don't want socialism, but the fact is, we are living it. We depend on these insitutions to do the right thing, and when they fail, everything around them fails as well. We don't want government in their business because they apparently know nothing about business. Seems the people in the business don't understand business either.

So... there you go.

[Reality_Check]

Excuses, excuses.

Face it, Gov't intervention caused the mess. Of course if you can disprove that, I'll be posting here how I was incorrect and shown the errors of my ways by you.

LMAO at your rather transparent attempt to goad me into this discussion. My purpose in posting on this thread was singular...to re-refute your CRA canard (as I repeatedly and unequivocally stated), which I did. Don't blame me for having focus. ;)

[BJJ-Blue]

LMAO at your rather transparent attempt to goad me into this discussion. My purpose in posting on this thread was singular...to re-refute your CRA canard (as I repeatedly and unequivocally stated), which I did. Don't blame me for having focus. ;)

You tried to refute 1 out of 3.

2 more to go and you got me. ;)

[BJJ-Blue]

First off, thanks for participating in the discussion.


I'd argue that LACK of government intervention caused the mess. Had there been any oversight on these financial institutions, auto industries, etc, we could have at least identified the problem before waiting until the meltdown. Laissez Faire stops the second their own greed can singlehandedly collapse the entire global economy. When that situation occurs, like it or not, you have to be a team player.

It was Bill Clinton, not GW Bush, who signed into law the Commodity Futures Modernization Act. That law was a huge deregulation of the banking industry.

But it was the Gov't intervention that allowed it to happen. Banks made bad loans and then other entities bought bundles of those bad loans as investments. So why would anyone buy bad loans? Because those loans were guaranteed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, ie the Government. No one in their right mind is going to buy worthless junk, but when the Gov't guarantees the junk, now it has value. Had they stayed out of the housing market and not guaranteed junk, no one would have been buying the junk, and thus the banks would have had to stop making more junk, ie the bad mortgages.


Your philosophy only applies to small businesses, where irresponsibility can only do so much damage, and replacing them comes easily. However, we were too successful for our own good, and now we have situations where, as a certain forefather pointed out, made banks more dangerous than standing armies.

Partially correct. And you are referring to Jefferson. ;)

Those banks would have never grown too big to fail without the billions in bad loans. Had the Gov't not gotten involved in the housing market, the banks wouldn't have been profiting off bad loans for over a decade. Since Gov't intervention allowed thebanks to profit while making bad decisions, they kept on making bad decisions. In short, Gov't allowed the banks to keep adding more and more floors to the house of cards.


If these major private banks were not bailed out, unlike GM, which may have had a successor lined up, what do you predict would have happened? Because most analysts from all walks of life, and of all political affiliations, agree that letting them fail would kick our way of life back to the stone age.

I predict capitalism would have prevailed, as it always does. Now I'm not saying it would have been painless. It may well have been a case of the cure hurting more than the disease. But there were plenty of banks and credit unions that did not make stupid loans, and thus were solvent and in the position to pick up some of the slack had the big ones been allowed to fail. And there would have no doubt been new investors starting up new banks to pick up the slack as well.


Underestimating the impact of something that we prevented from happening in no way reduces the scope of what COULD have happened. Had these banks not been allowed to run rampant, using assets they didn't have to grant loans to people who didn't deserve them, to pay for projects and investments which were risky to begin with, there would not have even been a discussion about a bailout, because we could have nipped the problem at the bud.

Again, the banks were allowed to run rampant due to Gov't interfernece. They didn't have to use assets they didn't have to grant loands. They had Gov't, via Fannie and Freddie, backing the loans.

But I do agree it could have been nipped in the bud. Had Gov't not guaranteed those loans, the banks making them would have lost money from the get go and been unable to unload the loans to other entities. And when businesses lose money doing something, they stop doing it. But since they were profitting, they kept it up.


We don't want socialism, but the fact is, we are living it. We depend on these insitutions to do the right thing, and when they fail, everything around them fails as well. We don't want government in their business because they apparently know nothing about business. Seems the people in the business don't understand business either.

So... there you go.

The people in private industry understood just fine how to make money. But they could not have done it via bad loans had not the Gov't guranteed the bad loans in the first place.

As to us not wanting socialism, I'll bet you are proved right on that assertion come November 2nd. ;)

[Drake]

So you are willing to disregard the massive amounts of corporate greed and lack of personal responsibility and blame this on the government? You think the government guarantees made any difference? At all? These are mortgages that people should have known would skyrocket. These loans put out lenders KNEW would cause defaults. It was GREED.

And you blame the government? Seriously?

[BJJ-Blue]

So you are willing to disregard the massive amounts of corporate greed and lack of personal responsibility and blame this on the government? You think the government guarantees made any difference? At all? These are mortgages that people should have known would skyrocket. These loans put out lenders KNEW would cause defaults. It was GREED.

And you blame the government? Seriously?

I've never disreguarded greed at all. It played a factor, without a doubt. Heck, even if I admit greed was the root of the problem, Gov't was the water. Without Gov't interference, they could not have profited off selling houses to people who could not pay for them. No matter how greedy they were.

You are correct that personal responsibility played a role. Personal responsibility could have also 'nipped it in the bud'. I was offered an ARM, I just said No. And I still have a roof over my head and good credit. So instead of facing foreclosure, my next financial decision is whether to buy a new 5.0 Mustang or an F-150 and a boat. :D